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Promotion Through the Gifts of Others

Years ago when I was working in corporate America, we did annual performance reviews and had to identify three areas of improvement for every employee. In many cases, the same weakness or opportunity for improvement showed up year after year. No matter how many times it was pointed out, the action plans and coaching never changed some specific traits.

All people just aren’t good at some things. There is no amount of encouragement that can remedy the deficiency of their design. The net result is wasted time focusing on areas that were never intended to be strengths instead of releasing the gifts to run without restraint. Nobody is happier or more motivated when being beat down about stuff they are not good at than when the unique gifts they possess are recognized, received and released.

Proverbs 18:16 says, “A man’s gift makes room for him and brings him before the great.” There is a definite benefit to giftedness. The gifts that God has put in our design are the things that facilitate our path towards our destiny.

I suppose that can mean a present like a candle holder or something. It can also mean the gifts that an individual’s abilities, when offered for the service of others, can make a way for them. The end result of selfless offering of the abilities that we possess is that we are afforded access to others that are great.

What about if we view that from the other perspective? What about if we consider that the receipt of the gifts promotes us into greater greatness? What if looking for, affirming, receiving and releasing the gifts in others is what makes us great in the first place?

Identifying and encouraging the gifts that are inherent in others requires several things:

Vision – to see what God has done in them and agree with Him

Humility – to allow for them to be more prominent than us in their area of giftedness

Courage – to trust them in their strengths exposes areas that may be weak in us

Vision, humility and courage sounds like a pretty good recipe for greatness. Others will want to serve us with their gifts when we want to release them in their giftedness. We will be facilitators of the destiny God intends for people when we receive their gifts and encourage their purpose. In the process, we can walk in the greatness we are designed for.